Scoring, serving, and the calls that matter — for squash, pickleball, tennis, padel, badminton, and table tennis. Illustrated, explained, and paired with a free live scoreboard.
Racquet sports are in the middle of a global boom. Squash made its Olympic debut at Paris 2024 and will return in Los Angeles. Pickleball is the fastest-growing participation sport in the United States for the third year running. Padel has exploded across Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East, with new courts opening every week. Badminton and table tennis remain among the most-played sports on earth by raw numbers, even if they rarely make Western headlines.
All of that growth means millions of new players stepping onto a court for the first time — and the single biggest barrier to enjoying a match is not fitness or technique, it is knowing the rules. Fair play starts with a shared understanding of how the score works, when you serve, and what the calls mean. If both players know the rules, every rally counts and nobody walks off the court arguing about the score.
That is why we built these guides: plain-English explanations of how scoring and serving work in every major racquet sport. And because knowing the rules is only half the problem — you still have to keep the score — we paired every guide with RALLY, a free live scoreboard that automates the hard part. It handles the scoring rules for all six sports, calls the score out loud in the correct convention, and even offers an AI referee that watches the court through your phone camera. Read the rules, then open the scoreboard. The rest takes care of itself.
Pickleball, badminton, and table tennis all use straightforward rally scoring — every rally produces a point, and you play to a fixed target (11 or 21). Tennis and padel are harder to follow because they use the 15-30-40-deuce-advantage sequence, layered inside games, sets, and tiebreaks.
Rally scoring means any player (or team) can win a point on any rally, regardless of who served. It replaced older "side-out" systems where only the server could score. Squash, pickleball (PPA format), badminton, and table tennis all use rally scoring today.
Squash, pickleball, and table tennis all play games to 11 points, win by 2. Squash is best of 5 games, pickleball is best of 3, and table tennis is best of 5 (or best of 7 at the Olympics).
Tennis and padel both use the 15-30-40-deuce-advantage point sequence, games to 6, and tiebreaks at 6-all. Their scoring is nearly identical — the main differences are in court layout and serving rules, not the score structure itself.
A tiebreak is a special game played to decide a set when both players reach 6 games all. In tennis and padel, the tiebreak is played to 7 points (win by 2), with service alternating every two points after the first. Squash, pickleball, and table tennis do not have tiebreaks — they simply require a two-point margin at the target score.
Yes — RALLY is a free live scorekeeper that supports squash, pickleball, tennis, padel, badminton, and table tennis. It handles all the scoring rules automatically, calls the score out loud, and even offers an AI referee that watches the court via your phone camera.
RALLY handles the scoring rules for squash, pickleball, tennis, padel, badminton, and table tennis — automatically. Two tap targets, voice calls in the correct convention, and an AI referee if you want it. No account required.